More of the Music of Barbra Streisand

Reviews and Commentaries for the Music of Barbra Streisand

Sonic Grade: F

An Audiophile Hall of Shame pressing and a Half-Speed Mastered Disaster if there ever was one.

The two CBS Half Speeds of the album that we played had very different sound. Imagine that! Our story:

We had two copies of the CBS Half-Speed in stock, and having just done a big shootout for the album, we decided to play them to see how they stood up against The Real Thing, the real thing in this case being a pretty common pressing: a plain old Columbia original.

One copy was dead as a doornail, so smooth, opaque and lifeless it would have put you to sleep.

The other literally sounded like a CD, and not a very good one at that.

Grungy, gritty, hard and cold, it was everything we analog lovers hate about digital.

We grade both copies F for Failing. If you want a good sounding one steer clear of the CBS Half Speed.

TRACK LISTING

Side One

Guilty
Woman in Love
Run Wild
Promises
The Love Inside

Side Two

What Kind of Fool
Life Story
Never Give Up
Make It Like a Memory

AMG 4 1/2 Star Rave Review

The biggest selling album of Barbra Streisand’s career is also one of her least characteristic. The album was written and produced by Barry Gibb in association with his brothers and the producers of the Bee Gees, and in essence it sounds like a post-Saturday Night Fever Bee Gees album with vocals by Streisand. Gibb adapted his usual style somewhat, especially in slowing the tempos and leaving more room for the vocal, but his melodic style and the backup vocals, even when they are not sung by the Bee Gees, are typical of them. Still, the record was more hybrid than compromise, and the chart-topping single “Woman in Love” has a sinuous feel that is both right for Streisand and new for her. Other hits were the title song and “What Kind of Fool,” both duets with Gibb. (The song “Guilty” won a Grammy Award for Best Pop Vocal by Duo or Group.)